The Zambia Alliance for Agroecology and Biodiversity Conservation is a united network of concerned citizens, civil society groups and farmer based organisations, working together to strengthen the growing movement for agroecology and food sovereignty in Zambia

ZAAB was initiated in 2010 when a number of civil society and farmer focused organisations came together to defend Zambia’s threatened ‘NO GMO’ presidential declaration of 2002. The civil society alliance continued to operate as a united advocacy network and grew in membership and scope of interest. In 2017, the network organisation was formalised and shortened its name to ZAAB (Zambia Alliance for Agroecology and Biodiversity) in acknowledgment of our holistic existence and biodiversity as a living system, integral to all human life.

Today, ZAAB advocates for citizens’ rights to food sovereignty, embedded within an ecological and socially just Zambia. We support the adoption of agroecology as a holistic, citizenry solution to sustainably build Zambia’s food and farming systems and strengthen resilience against climate change.  

ZAAB is concerned that our future is being threatened as economic benefits for a minority are consistently prioritised over and above basic human rights of the majority population and environmental sustainability. Zambia’s agro-food systems are increasingly industrialised, underpinned by the symbolic, so called ‘Green Revolution'. We witness the progressive privatization and control of land, seeds, forests, water, labour – as well as markets – and thus whole production and consumption systems.

Around the world, corporate agribusiness and food retail industries hold increasing market share, that strengthens their power to further control the functioning of the global agro-food system. Many African countries including Zambia, are being compelled to amend national legislation to facilitate increased export oriented trade and the market benefits of multinational corporations. In the process, agrobiodiversity and locally contextual, culturally appropriate nutritious food systems are devalued and destroyed, while inequality rises and communities are dislocated.

Agroecology has developed as a global alternative to industrial agriculture. The science of agroecology applies ecological concepts and principles to the design and management of production systems.

“Today agroecology has been taken up by rural social movements and progressive NGOs and academics, and is seen as a transformative science, practice and movement that is explicitly committed to a more just and sustainable future by reshaping power relations from farm to table” (Declaration: The role of agroecology on the future of agriculture and the food system. The Call from Brasilia, September 2017)